


The Mark Effect

by sunstruck (sesunmi)



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Developing Relationship, First Meetings, Fluff, M/M, Medical Student Lee Jeno, Online Friendship, Social Media
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-09
Updated: 2021-01-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:28:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28244688
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sesunmi/pseuds/sunstruck
Summary: Symptoms include but are not limited to:- elevated heart rate- difficulty swallowing- a persistent and unrelenting crush on one Mark Lee
Relationships: Lee Jeno/Mark Lee
Comments: 8
Kudos: 74
Collections: NCTV Secret Santa 2020





	The Mark Effect

**Author's Note:**

  * For [mr_loverman](https://archiveofourown.org/users/mr_loverman/gifts).



> hey prompter your prompts were lovely but i just got...brain stuck...so i’m afraid i didn’t hit everything in this prompt TT___TT i’m sorry for that i hope you like this fic though because i really suffered through writing this little baby
> 
> content warning before we get into things: overall this thing is pretty soft and squishy but...jeno is a med student, so there is some discussion about dead bodies and dissecting cadavers. most of the descriptions are about the smell. i just want to give a heads up.

Jeno only notices it after he's checked Twitter for the first time in three months. There's an unfamiliar name, Mark Lee, in his dms, an unread message a week old. He’s content to let it marinate longer and ignore it entirely, but his mind echoes with those words Jaemin uttered to him days ago: "Jeno, you cryptid."

Though he's not really a spiteful person, he doesn't—or at least he thinks he doesn't have spiteful tendencies, that bugs him enough to check what Mark Lee has sent him. Maybe Jeno will make a new friend, even. (That's not really likely, given how his low maintenance friendships have died off of malnourishment, a lack of texting, hanging out, normal people things. Not time for that anymore, physiology and textbook information being processed through his head. There's still leisure time, but it's not really "free time" anymore.)

So he opens it.

 _Hi, Jeno! I found a picture here and I was wondering if grant us permission to use and publish it in Borders Magazine. There’s more intricate details involved with this process, but please let me know if you’d allow us to use this. :) -Mark Lee_ [shadywebsite.com/idk-how-urls-work/this-won’t-lead-anywhere-so-please-don’t-click-me/1322925911293874176/photo/2]

The message reads awkward and stilted, like one of those spam emails from proposing business, asking if he’d like to distribute 25kgs of gold and invest in foreign insurance bonds while Jeno’s drowning in student loan debt. Or maybe it isn’t. Maybe it’s the one too many James Veitch spam jokes getting to him. But maybe it’s really spam, with the punctuation errors. _If grant us permission…._

Jeno, very adept at Adulting, sends a thoughtless response. 

_What_

Then, as an afterthought: _I’m not clicking on that_

Then he stops thinking about it and forgets about its existence for another week.

* * *

It’s a day proximal to the first anatomy lab when Jeno checks the message again.

He really should ignore it, but the vestiges for self-indulgence and curiosity win out. Adjusting to this new life has squashed that tendency quite a bit, but he's still shedding that skin.

Over watching videos of dissections, pictures of cadavers, things of that sort, he decides to ease his nerves through scrolling through his Twitter messaging history of all things.

_.. understandable_

Short, simple, with punctuation errors (he notes to himself as if he hasn’t scrapped grammar entirely when writing his notes...). It sounds human though, so Jeno responds back, though he feels slightly guilty about responding so late.

_I’m glad you understand_

Two hours later, with dry, tired eyes from poring over notes and one Jaemin Na beside him, they have finished studying for the night, and Jeno checks it once again. Lo and behold, there is a response.

“Oh? What’s this?” Jaemin asks, leaning over to peek over his shoulder for a look.

Jeno turns his head, and when Jaemin raises tilts his head, he simply shrugs. What can he say? “This guy named Mark Lee is in my Twitter dms.”

“Jeno, open it? I wanna see.”

Jaemin drawls out loud with his vocal fry, somehow still able to make it sound like a whine. Jeno complies, opening the message. He scrolls through as Jaemin reads the message out loud.

_Yeah, hahaha sorry about that...I wrote that message while burning the midnight fuel. That’s why it’s so...yeah..._

_I wanted to use this pic of yours for our mag_

_Write a story to publish along with it; it’s a good photo dude_

_Um_

_I just realized since it’s a personal picture there’s probably no copyright over this but going ahead and using it without asking just feels wrong_

_So here I am asking haha_

_:)_

"Smiley-face," Jeno finds himself saying, the corners of his lips quirking up of their own volition. 

"He seems cute. A bit awkward, in a cute way." Jaemin plops back down in his own chair and props his head up with his left hand, elbow on the table. "What are you going to say back?"

He doesn't know. He doesn't even remember taking this photo...how old is it? How did Mark Lee dig it up? How did Mark Lee find him? Is Mark Lee some sort of cyberstalker, some creep?

"I don't know him."

"Yeah, but don't leave him hanging! He's not asking you out or anything, just asking for blanket permission to write a story to your photograph and put it in a magazine." Jaemin clicks his tongue. "Jeno, you're twenty-three."

Jeno ignores Jaemin in favor of drafting a response.

_Yeah, sounds good :)_

_I wanna ask you some things though, if that's ok w/ u?_

* * *

Against his better judgement, Jeno decides to do some research.

Mark Lee has a sizeable follower count, clocking in at an impressive eleven-thousand. A quick google search shows that while he doesn't have his own wikipedia page, he's distinguished enough that there's a sizeable amount of information of him on the internet. There's an article in there, something about poems, but instead of clicking that, Jeno narrows his search down to be more specific. "Mark Lee poetry," he says to himself as he types it out on his phone, squinting.

Various YouTube videos pop up, and Jeno thinks to himself, _why not?_ And just like that, he's sucked into the rabbit hole of videos of Mark Lee reciting poetry.

He remembers doing something like this once — in seventh grade, in front of 30 people with sweaty palms and a squeaky voice, stammering words out in an inelegant fashion.

Mark's is nothing like that. It's got to be an artform. The cadence of his voice rises and falls, as does his inflection, his face, what he does with his hands, the way he gives words weight — feather light and gentle, slowly crescendoing into something cacophonous and heavy, and Jeno finds himself completely and utterly transfixed, body numb and alert, listening to every word.

He scrolls up to click another video. It's already 11:30 and his day starts at seven...he should really go to sleep.

One more video.

Another one.

* * *

Going through the day with a sleep-addled mind is terrible, as is working with the cadavers, but his senses are all muddied and the smell of the chemicals and the bodies doesn't hit him quite as hard as he thought it would. In a sense, maybe it's a blessing.

He spills his thoughts to Jaemin, who simply laughs and shakes his head fondly.

“You are so out of it,” Jaemin tells him. “I thought you would take it worse than you did, because, you know. Corpses.”

Oh, right. Those bodies, those corpses. They were people, once, but they’re just...they’re just bodies now. Meat and bones. 

And though there’s still some sort of respect to be held, he didn’t really...Jeno had expected this sense of reverence to be there. There wasn’t any of that, really. Just the cadaver beneath his hands, him peeling the flesh back and removing the excess fat as instructed for cosmetic purposes. It’s ceased to resemble a human.

Is he out of touch? Is this a normal thing? He’s emotionally distancing himself to stay capable of handling a dead human, and calling that respect, as per lab etiquette, just sounds...wrong.

But he’s chosen this career path, set on his way on earning a degree in medicine, built upon hours and hours of hard work and a brain chock-full of knowledge. This is necessary. The musings of these questions can be left to those who don’t hold lives between their mind and fingers.

In any case...things stink. This situation, the cadavers, even his own fingers. That latter part...god. The chemical stew soaking into his hands through the gloves through the entirety of the process. What an unpleasant feeling. But he’s not here for pleasantries, is he?

Jaemin taught him this trick when they were younger. You massage listerine into your hands before washing as usual to get rid of the smell. Then, their hands stank of garlic, pruney from helping mom make kimchi. Now, they’re washing off the smell of chemicals and flesh, and it’s going to — no, _will be_ a mainstay. The human body is the staple of everything he’s studying. And that is just so disorienting and mind-boggling to think about. 

Gone from handling garlic and kimchi to slowly decomposing bodies. His hands smell of mint mouthwash stronger than ever before.

* * *

When he remembers to check it, he’s half asleep, dreaming about his nonexistent relationships. Jeno doesn’t get much time to himself anymore, weekends aside. His human contact is limited to his classes, which fill his day up to five, then he’s free from academia, but that’s time he’ll be spending on essential things as well. Eating, sleeping, showering, studying. There’s no huge chunks of time of just nothingness, but there is this dull ache in his body from doing the same rote thing every day. But that’s also, in some sense, isnt that a good thing?

Right, Mark. Mark and his smooth, lulling voice.

Mark Lee has messaged him back, and he’s not equipped in any capacity to respond at the moment. He doesn’t want to leave him on read or ghost him, that would just be rude. So hesitantly, even though he know he’ll freak over it approximately a minute from now, he formulates a message to send.

Within this internal struggle of _be polite!_ vs. _you don’t know this dude.._ one’s got to win out. But even if he doesn’t really know this dude, Mark seems pretty cool.... Jeno wonders what it would be like to just soak in his presence while sitting on his lap. If he were a cat, maybe he could get away with doing that.

 _Sorry, i’m really out of it right now_ , hit send.

Immediate regret. Immediate regret. Uncomfortable, uncharted territory.

No, no no. No.

He stares at the offending message. It’s already been marked as seen. Mark's icon pops up and a loading text bubble appears next to his name.

_its fine_

_shoot those questions when you’re ready_

_Nice_ , Jeno thinks in his mind, narrated by Jaemin’s voice. Jaemin’s definition of nice differs from his though. Iced americanos with enough caffeine to cause heart palpitations, spending time curled up in the fetal position to keep himself warm over simply covering himself with a blanket, the wide eyed look that barista boy sends him when he utters his coffee order. 

He doesn’t really know what he’s doing. So he sends a cat pic. What could go wrong with that?

  


_cat :)_

🥰 _awwww_

And all this emotional constipation that he can’t quite put into words? Maybe Mark will understand. And he seems to like cats too, which is a win for Jeno.

* * *

_Can I see what you wrote for it?_

_um_

_The mag’s not out so we don’t want anyone looking at it_

_sorry lol_

_there should be some of my stuff online though_

_Oh alright_

_Is that an indication that I can go ham in the searches_

He types this while smiling, as if he hasn’t already done that. But he does it again, just for posterity. And lo and behold, he finds something new!

It’s a high school literary magazine, and under the 2015 issue, there’s a Mark Lee next to something titled _Crunch_ , underlined in blue. He clicks on it, and it leads to a poem.

He stares at it. Stares for a minute, unblinking, then he screenshots the poem and sends it to Jaemin, because he doesn’t know what to think.

Chips. It’s about chips. A poem about chips, the crunch, the mindful details of eating and swallowing down fried potatoes mass produced by a faceless corporation, reaching out for more to chew until there’s nothing left and there’s just emptiness again.

He stares. He has the brains of the operations right here. Why not ask about it directly? 

_?_

_lol_

_oh my god_

_how did you find that_

_I looked_

_How did this poem come to be?_

_Your poetry slam performances are really good_

_How did you get into poetry?_

* * *

After that, messaging Mark is surprisingly easier. By no means is it comfortable or familiar — he’s got his nerves bunched up about this. He’s nervous. But his hands don’t shake as much as they did when he made that first cut, incision in. This metaphor really isn’t appropriate because Mark’s not a specimen for him to dissect but a living, breathing human being, but framing it this way soothes his nerves just slightly.

His heart rate elevates when he texts him, he gets cotton-mouth and feels warm and squirmy just thinking about him. And this is something he acknowledges: he has a persistent, unrelenting crush on Mark Lee despite how he hasn’t ever seen him in person.

Jaemin calls it the Mark Effect.

“There’s more,” he says, adding gochujang into his bowl spoonful by spoonful. His rice is already _drowning_ in red, but he insists on adding more.

“Just looking at your bowl makes my mouth hurt,” Jeno complains. “You’re crazy.”

“And you’re stupid,” Jaemin responds, fond and soft, looking up to make eye contact as the corners of his lips quirk up into a grin. “No.”

Jaemin’s masochistic tastebuds have long been a lost cause, so Jeno concedes, curiosity prickling at him. “What is more? What are you talking about?”

“Well, this is based on my gut,” Jaemin says, like that lends him any credibility. Jisung the barista served him a cafe mocha on the house which he downed without question even though he hates milk. _I find him cute,_ sure, but that doesn’t mean Jaemin should have subjected himself to bloating and an unpleasant trip to the toilet. Does Jisung even know that Jaemin is lactose intolerant?

Jeno doesn’t say that though. It’s unnecessary and inappropriate, and they’re in the middle of dinner. Not that it would gross Jaemin out—but the table etiquette his mom’s instilled in him has stayed. You don’t talk about this sort of thing at the dinner table.

“...Jeno?” 

“Sorry, I wasn’t listening,” he replies, without an ounce of shame.

Jaemin tuts and shakes his head. “Jeno-yah,” he drawls, fixing a look of disappointment on his face. “I guess you’ll have to live without knowing.”

* * *

“Your heart beats faster over a dude who wrote a poem about the nature of eating potato chips.” Jaemin says to Jeno.

“To be fair, it was in a high school literary magazine,” Jeno responds. He can feel his face warming up, and his cheeks are hot to the touch. His pulse is racing. 

To say this is embarrassing would be an understatement. Everything about this is embarrassing. Everything about this crush makes him feel like a teenager again, evokes adrenaline. It’s humiliating.

That’s why he’s sworn off feeling shame about this. Or he’s tried. It only works sometimes, when he forgets about Jaemin’s own mildly embarrassing situation with Jisung the Starbucks barista.

There’s something Renjun said that just kind of stuck with him and refused to leave his mind. Something about him not giving a damn about anyone he hasn’t known since he was twelve.

The thing is, Renjun's words were very true. That's why they had sat, marinating in a storage cabinet of forgotten memories.

This...whatever his thing with Mark is, it's entirely different.

Oh, how the tables have turned. He is a faceless entity, a denizen of the internet to Mark. And that’s what Mark should be to him, but instead, Mark Lee is this dream. This dude for him to admire and instastalk to his delight. Mark Lee tempts him to scrap his dignity—just reach out and say, hey, I see you’re nearby, do you maybe want to meet in person?

He’s not doing that. It's too embarrassing.

He's content with what he already has.

* * *

Texting Mark becomes a staple of his life at some point, common enough that Mark is part of his daily routine. Med school monopolizes his time through Mondays and Fridays, bar for the night hours, which are saved for studying. Jeno sends Mark a couple cat pictures before tucking his phone into a cabinet, lest he be tempted to glue himself to his phone, keeping up a text-conversation for Mark for a ludicrous amount of time.

The crush hasn't gone away. If anything, it's gotten worse. He thinks about asking Mark if he wants to hang out more frequently than ever, but doesn't dare ask.

Mark is the one who reaches out.

_hey, how do u feel about meeting in person?_

_since you're also in city b meeting up wouldn't be too hard_

Without knowing it, Mark's broached through Jeno's protective layer, his nerves. He’s vulnerable like this, and Mark probably doesn't even know. Doesn’t know how Jeno feels his blood rushing to his head, his pulse pounding in his ears, this electric feeling tingling in his spine from something so small.

He breathes, and wonders if his metaphorical guts will spill out from the hole in his metaphorical belly.

Honesty is the best policy.

_I’d love to, actually_

* * *

After they arrange the meeting, Jeno pushes his thoughts to the back of his mind and pretends like it doesn't exist. Out of sight, out of mind. This is the predicament of a future-Jeno, but not the Jeno of today.

The thing is though, that he procrastinates on processing his thoughts and feelings and refuses to think about it even during the day _of_ said meeting. This sort of thing typically doesn't work out well, so his elated feelings and debbie-downerisms cancel each other out.

He meets Mark at the exit of a tram stop. It's a pretty innocuous thing, drama free thing and it goes less awkwardly than what he was expecting—a tap on the shoulder that has him turn his head, then he's face to face with one Mark Lee, and _oh god, he's wearing glasses,_ and he forgets how to breathe.

"Oh, Mark? Mark Lee?"

"That's me," Mark confirms, tone dulcet and soothing. If a voice could be described as warm, that would be what Mark sounds like. Warm.

"I'm Jeno," he responds, searching for something to say. Mark smiles in return.

"It's nice to finally meet you, dude. I'm kinda hungry though, so can we grab some food? I gotta eat."

Jeno finds that he doesn't mind at all.

They settle in the corner of a burger joint, with a view of the river through the glass walls. It's not the most scenic or atmospheric thing, but it's simple, with comfortable city noise filtering in, and it seems to put them both at ease. This sort of situation is familiar—Jeno's not familiar with Mark, not yet, but situations like these aren't foreign to him.

The easiness makes his insides crawl with doubt. He's glad that talking to Mark is easy, but it really shouldn't be. His brain to mouth filter is still there; thank god, but his impulse control sure isn't. And every time Mark says his name, his heart skips two beats. It's a pavlovian response to the thought of Mark saying his name, and he sits attentively, breath bated. The metaphorical butterflies in his stomach are swamped with birds that catch them between their beaks and tear them apart, but their efforts aren't enough and he feels like they'll fly up his esophagus and escape through the words coming out of his mouth.

Mark listens to Jeno talk about his himself—it's not really interesting, and he probably uses far too much medical jargon, but not once does he ask Jeno to stop. He nearly finds himself delving into the specifics of cadaver storage, but he manages to catch himself. It would be a bit strange to talk about human corpses over burgers and fries.

"What are the labs like?" Mark asks, eyes shining and eyebrows raised as he reaches across the table to steal Jeno's fry.

"They smell," Jeno says, ever so eloquently.

"Well, yeah, I remember that." Mark says, and Jeno feels his eyebrows fly to his hairline.

"How would you know?"

"I dissected a fetal pig in high school." Mark scrunches up his face and wrinkles his nose. It's so cute that Jeno would have excused his hasty assumption of Mark's...extracurricular activities if they happened to be true.

"Oh, I thought you were talking about human corpses. That's a relief."

Mark laughs. That can't be taken as confirmation, but it's important, because more importantly, he can feel warmth in his chest. Maybe if he were a catboy, his tail would be quivering with satisfaction.

By the time the vestiges of the fries are gone, Jeno is emotionally prepared to mark Mark as his human and follow him home. _Oh,_ he thinks to himself. _Oh no. The feelings aren't going to be going away. They're here to stay._

It's terminal, deadly, and gentle enough that he doesn't even mind it taking him away.

**Author's Note:**

>  **post reveals:** hehehe....IT WAS ME !!!
> 
> [cc](https://curiouscat.me/sesunmi)   
>  [twt](https://twitter.com/sesunmii)


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